The Press Club foreign affairs debate last week and the defence version the week before showed those areas won’t decide the outcome.

Bipartisanship reduces political brawling. Plibersek referred to Labor’s broad agreement with the Liberals on the US alliance, international institutions and engagement with Asia. Bishop nodded the same way.

What, then, separates the Libs and Labor in foreign policy?

You’ll not be surprised that on the answers from the two deputy leaders, Labor presents as the multilateralist/internationalist, the Liberals as pragmatic realists.

Plibersek’s analysis:

‘The greatest difference is in our approach to those problems without passports—the big global issues that face us. Climate change, the movement of people, the rise of non-state actors, health pandemics in an increasingly interconnected world. We think that Australia’s best chance of security and prosperity, too, is being part of a secure and prosperous world. And that requires us to be a good global citizen.’

The Libs aren’t going to let Labor own ‘good international citizen’, even if Gareth Evans has part copyright. Bishop said the Libs do good by being good at what they do:

‘I believe the difference comes down to approach. There’s a commendable level of bipartisanship in most areas of foreign policy. But it’s the difference in approach. Labor is very keen on White Papers and strategies but then not funding them and not delivering on them. It’s all very well to have an Asian White Paper but then if you don’t fund it and you don’t deliver any outcomes, it’s of no use. They had Defence White Papers but didn’t ever fund them. So, as Sir Arthur Tange said, a strategy without funding is no strategy at all.’

Now to the Indonesia time-bomb. As so often, it arrives via East Timor. Poor Timor Leste – independence won at grievous cost yet still buffeted by the needs of two big neighbours.

Plibersek announced in February that a Labor government would accept international arbitration over Australia’s sea boundary/resources dispute with Timor Leste.

At the Press Club, Plibersek said Australia should do what it’s urging China to do in the South China Sea—abide by the decision of the International Court of Justice.

Labor would ditch Canberra’s stance that the existing bilateral treaty with Dili is generous and shouldn’t be reopened.

The stand rests on Australia’s 2002 decision to withdraw from the maritime jurisdiction of the International Court of Justice and the International Tribunal for the Law of the Sea.

Bishop swiped Plibersek for not getting detailed briefings from Foreign Affairs before making the Timor change. Plibersek retorted that she was briefed and understood the issues.

The to-and-fro about full knowledge is when that faint ticking started.

Australia is being tough about Timor Leste’s border so it doesn’t set off the border time-bomb with Indonesia.

If Australia accepts international arbitration because the existing Timor treaty is ‘unfair’, that opens the way for Indonesia to do the same.

Jakarta has long maintained it was ‘taken to the cleaners’ by Australia in twoseabed boundary agreements signed in 1971 and 1972.

Those treaties divided ownership by referring to the continental shelf, drawing the boundary well north of the median line between the shores of Australia and Indonesia. More for Oz, less for Indonesia.

Since then, international law has embraced the median-line concept. In international arbitration today, Indonesia would expect to get a lot of what is currently Oz.